Do's and Don'ts - Household Wiring

Connecting a portable electric generator directly to your household wiring can be deadly. A generator that is connected to your home's wiring can back feed into the power lines connected to your home.

Utility transformers can then increase this lower electrical voltage to thousands of volts, which is more than enough to kill a utility line person making outage repairs kilometers away. You could also cause extensive damage to utility equipment, home appliances and your generator.

If you wish to hard wire a generator to your home, it should be installed by a licensed electrician with an approved cut-off switch that will automatically disconnect the home from the power grid when the generator is being used. You can also utilise an ATS (automatic transfer switch), which provides automatic switching of the house from utility to generator supply and back again. This can also be programmed for testing or to change under different operating parameters.

Please check with your local utility company and building office before installing a hard wired generator.